As the demand for Internet use grows, the need for high speed internet access is also growing. Deregulation has allowed different service providers to compete for voice, video and data subscribers. Cable TV companies have installed fiber optics and upgraded their networks to become a leader in the area of high speed Internet access service.
Phone companies are deploying DSL technology to enable higher bandwidth Internet connectivity over traditional phone lines while stopping the tying up of phone circuits. The phone companies have achieved reasonable penetration and higher bandwidth than cable modems, although the technology is distance limited resulting in limited subscriber coverage. In addition, access to DSL is also limited by twisted pair copper line integrity. Thus, DSL is not available to many phone company subscribers. A new technology being developed allows voice to be carried via cable modems (voice over internet protocol or “VoIP”). Thus, many cable companies are beginning to offer bundled service packages of voice, video, and ultra high speed data services.
Bundled service offerings have become a goal of multiple service providers. However, cable modem technology utilizes a shared medium, and, thus, has security and bandwidth limitations. High penetration rates result in reduced data speeds at peak usage times, and thus cable modem technology cannot support high bandwidth to all users simultaneously.
Direct broadcast satellite (“DBS”) companies and wireless companies are also offering Internet access services using telephone connections to achieve bi-directional traffic flow.
The telephone companies' installed access network technology reaches homes and other end points with twisted pair copper wires. Due to the limitations of copper cable media, the current telephone access network technology is reaching its physical bandwidth limit.
Therefore, although a number of high bandwidth networks are available for data, voice and video, the access technology at the edge of traditional networks tends to cause bottlenecks. Access to homes may be through twisted copper pair wiring, which may have a capacity of one millionth of the capacity of the portion of the network to which it is connected. For example, a “long haul” portion of the network may have a capacity of terabits per second and a “metro” portion of the network may have a capacity of hundreds of gigabits per second, while the “access” part of the network, connected to the metro portion, may have a capacity of only hundreds of kilobits per second per user. For “this” example, an access technology having a bandwidth of 10–100 Mbps per user may be required when all users are “online” at the same time.
In view of the foregoing, it would be desirable to provide a technique for providing a standards based access network technology solution which overcomes the above-described inadequacies and shortcomings. More particularly, it would be desirable to provide a technique for providing secure, high bandwidth, standards based access network technology in an efficient and cost effective manner.